I have an existing system that utilizes Word and vba to build a customized document out of text snippets and then let users complete the editing. What would be the recommended approach to take with flex?
What the current Word/VBA system does: - create a doc from a template (starting point) - alter header info and logo to match the org creating the doc - replace placeholder text with text from database - insert values from db into bookmarks - allow the user to select and then insert text snippets with formatting into the doc. In word, a dialog box opens which presents a list of text snippets (each snippet has a title, the title is presented in the list) and when the user selects a list item it's data (paragraph(s) or phrase) is inserted into the document. - save completed doc as pdf I would prefer to create and edit the document in a db table's rtf field, and output to pdf if needed, than actually construct a file system document dynamically. There is a workflow process with different editors at different stages, I'm thinking keeping it all in a db field might be cleaner than passing a physical document around. Possibly all I'd need to do is to have a primary template with placeholder text entries; and perform replace operations in the sql backend. Manual editing would be done in whatever flex uses for rich text editing. Export to pdf didn't look like a built in capability with flex, but I'm sure I can dig more on that out of the list. Just looking for anyone's input on a sensible approach to this problem.